Laugh, Clown, Laugh is Lon Chaney as a clown who adopts an abandoned girl, loves her as she grows up, and must hide his feelings behind his painted smile.
Laugh, Clown, Laugh (1928), directed by Herbert Brenon and based on a play by David Belasco and Tom Cushing, stars Chaney as Tito, a clown in a travelling circus who finds an abandoned baby girl, Flore, raises her as his own, and, years later, falls in love with her as a young woman, while a younger man also loves her.
Chaney’s Tito, with a clown’s smile painted over a breaking heart, is one of his most moving performances. His love for Flore is paternal and romantic at once, and the film’s tragedy comes from Tito’s inability to speak his feelings, except through his act.
It is a signature role because it is Chaney’s most tender clown, and because it shows, again, that behind the makeup was a man who felt deeply.